FILE PHOTO: Charlie Kirk, Turning Point USA founder, puts on a MAGA hat during the AmericaFest 2024 conference sponsored by conservative group Turning Point in Phoenix, Arizona, U.S. December 19, 2024. REUTERS/Cheney Orr/File Photo

MSNBC Daily opinion editor Jarvis DeBerry said Tennessee State University security did the right thing when they escorted two uninvited Charlie Kirk wannabes off the HBCU’s campus.

Both without permits, the two white men set up a table on the Nashville grounds, taped inflammatory signs to their table and dared Black students to “debate” them in Kirk’s “Prove Me Wrong” style. Students responded instead with jeers, gestures and laughingly bolted away with their signs before security intervened and escorted them away, seemingly for their own safety.

“The pair’s provocation was not received well at TSU, which, of course, was the visitors’ point: to be rejected, to characterize the Black students as intolerant of debate and to gloat that they’d won their arguments by virtue of the Black students being intolerant of their presence,” wrote DeBerry, noting the two made a point to record their dismissal for MAGA online fans to crucify.

DeBerry said it was unfortunate to see so many people on social media claiming TSU students, should have responded by debating the pair, especially since the men were not looking for debate.

“The proposition that the students should have debated their obnoxious guests reminds me of a theory being promoted in journalism circles some years ago,” said DeBerry, citing requests by editors that opinion writers and columnists sound off in comment sections.

“[Reporters would] be showing that we’re real people, our editors insisted, and we’d be encouraging similarly civil people to participate, which would help transform the tone of such sections,” said DeBerry. “The guidance was based on the faulty premise that people were in the comments section for a good-faith exchange of ideas — when most were there only to be obnoxious and “pwn” the opposition.”

It was a faulty argument, and foolish to think “folks with such a mindset were interested in debate,” said DeBerry, who described the online exchange as a “waste of time.”

“This is good advice in real life, too,” DeBerry added. “That’s why the students shouldn’t feel any embarrassment or shame in not falling into the ‘debate me’ trap. Because that’s all it is: a trap.”

Real debates are intellectual exercises between people who are factually prepared and open to persuasion, said DeBerry. The ultimate goal is a pursuit of truth, not “owning” the opposition or grandstanding.

“It’s a shame that since Kirk’s death, arguing in bad faith has become characterized as virtuous and edifying. It’s not. And it’s not beneficial to try to rebut people making bad faith arguments because, by definition, people making bad faith arguments can’t be persuaded of anything,” DeBerry said. “No, the students at TSU didn’t owe the so-called debaters any of their time or attention. Like so many HBCU students since Kirk’s death, saying “Leave us alone” is enough.

Read the full MSNBC report at this link.